John Herbert Waldrop was born on February 24, 1895, in Hendersonville, North Carolina. Waldrop was a bank teller for the Greenville Bank & Trust Company when he registered for the draft (World War I) in June 1917. He was inducted into the service in October 1917 and served with the 321st Infantry and the 3rd Replacement Regiment until his honorably discharge in December 1918. He died in Greenville (Pitt County) on July 25, 1966.